The bun feet were not a complete sphere as they had a flat section.  While I was able to put this flat section on the bed of my miter saw, the rounded section of the sphere was up against the fence.  The potential for the piece to rotate as I cut it was high.  As well as ruining an expensive fixture it could have caused a dangerous kickback.  As expensive as the bun feet were, my fingers are worth more, so I needed to figure out a way to hold the bun feet so that the cut could be performed on my miter saw accurately and safely.

A couple of pieces of scrap wood screwed together made a jig which allowed just that.  The bun foot is secured to the jig by a 1 1/2″ screw through the jig and into the base of the foot as well as an additional screw through the base of the jig and into the flat section of the bun foot These areas would be against the tile floor and the toe kick  so the holes formed by the screw would be hidden after installation.  The screws, as with the screws used to assemble the jig, would also be out of the way of the cut so the blade wouldn’t be damaged.

As you can see in the image below the bun foot is now held securely and square to the base and fence of the miter saw.   There is no danger of the bun foot moving or rotating in any direction or axis.  The jig also allows me plenty of room to hold it with my fingers far from the spinning blade.

The cut complete.

The bun foot installed.

Typically a miter saw, table saw and band saw are used to cut objects that sit flat on the bed and have a square edge that will ride against the fence.  However, with the use of simple but effective jigs it is possible to cut round and irregular shaped objects.  When designing the jig keep these points in mind:

• The jig must be large enough to allow you to hold/guide it and keep your hands/fingers away from the blade.
• The jig must hold the workpiece securely so there is no possibility of rotation or movement while performing the cut.
• Any fasteners used to assemble the jig or hold the workpiece, screws, nails, clamps etc, need to be positioned so that the blade is not cutting into them.

Above all, if there is any doubt in your mind at all about the safety of the cut, then don’t make it.  There is no cut that is worth bleeding over!

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The first step is to mark the center line of where the hinge will be positioned.   Then position the jig using the alignment arrows and clamp it in place.  Note: the clamp is on the underside, or show face of the door.  You can’t see it in the following picture and I didn’t take a picture showing it.  Sorry, my bad.

Set the stop collar on the bit guide so the bit drills to the correct depth.  I like to drill a test hole in a scrap piece of wood and make sure the hole is deep enough to allow the hinge to fit in without bottoming out.

The bit guide is then positioned over the alignment plate.   The wide circumference of the bit guide ensures that the bit is held square to the work surface, important when drilling with a large Forstner bit. As the  bit guide fits over the alignment plate it also stops the bit from wandering.

After placing the hinge in the hole, check that the back of the hinge is parallel to the frame using a square.

Use a self centering bit to drill pilot holes for the hinge screws.

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I like to apply the edge banding to the sides of the shelf first, and then to the front and back of the shelf.  It is a small touch, but it means the front edging is overlapping the side edging and so there is less chance of any joint being visible when viewing the installed shelving.

The first step is to secure the shelf in a vise. Then, using a pair of scissors cut a piece of edging about an inch longer than needed.  I don’t have a dedicated iron for this job.  Up till now I’ve managed to sneak my wife’s iron out to the workshop, I’m pretty sure she doesn’t read this blog either so I think I’m safe!  I set the iron to the “cotton” setting.  That would be the hotter setting, although I’m not much of an expert when it comes to irons.  Slowly move the iron over the edging so that the adhesive melts and sticks the edging to the shelf.  As you do this make sure the edging overlaps the shelf slightly on each side.  The edging is 13/16″ wide so you should have about a sixteenth overlap on each side of standard 3/4″ plywood.

Then, apply pressure to the edging using a veneer roller.

Using a pair of scissors, cut the edging on each side, leaving about an 1/8″.

Using a double edge trimmer, trim both edges flush to the plywood.

Using a veneer trimmer, square off the ends of the edging.  This is a pretty expensive tool and for a long time I was reluctant to buy it and so used to use a utility knife for this part of the operation.  I must admit that once I purchased the veneer trimmer I was pleased with how much cleaner the cuts were and how much quicker I was able to make the cuts.

The final step is to touch up the edges using some 220 grit sandpaper.  I like to sand at a slight angle to put a small bevel on the edge.

The corner of the shelf once complete.

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I use a router a lot in my workshop, both hand held and table router.  However, I can remember when I got my first router and the learning curve I went through figuring out which direction to move the router when routing by hand or the workpiece when routing on the table router.   Hopefully I can help others out and make that learning curve not quite as exciting!

Essentially the workpiece always needs to be feed into the bit, so the first thing you need to know is which way is the bit rotating.  Lets deal with the table mounter router first.   Hold out your right hand in a classic “thumbs up” gesture.  Imagine your hand is the router and your right thumb is the router bit.  The direction of the router bit follows the curve of your fingers.  In this case, it is counter clockwise.  You can see this clearly in the picture below.

Now rotate your right hand into a “thumbs down” gesture.  Again imagine your hand is the router and your right thumb is the router bit.  The direction of the router bit is still indicated by the curve of your fingers, in this case it is clockwise.  You can see this in the picture below.

This “right-hand thumb rule” applies to almost anything that spins, faucets, right hand thread screws etc.

So, moving back to the router table, you can see that in order to feed the workpiece into the router bit, you need to feed from right to left, assuming you are standing facing the fence.   By feeding from right to left you are feeding the workpiece against the direction of rotation of the bit.  The natural reaction as the workpiece contacts with the bit is to push the workpiece back towards you.  By controlling the workpiece, by hand and through the use of featherboards, you prevent this from happening.

Feeding from left to right, the rotation of the bit would grab the workpiece and pull it forcefully from right to left.  This can happen in the blink of an eye and the danger is, aside from ruining the workpiece, that you don’t release it and your fingers are pulled towards the router bit.

For the same reason the fence always needs to be positioned so that side of the router bit that is furthest away from the fence is doing the cutting.  To illustrate, suppose you need to route a groove or dado that is 1″ wide, but the largest bit you have is a 3/4″ straight bit.  Obviously the groove will have to be cut with two passes.  The first pass will form a 3/4″ groove and then the fence can be moved 1/4″ in order to make the groove a full 1″ wide after the second pass.  No problem.

However, it is very important that the fence be moved in the right direction before the second pass.  Moving the fence closer to the router bit would mean that the side of the router bit that is closest to the fence is doing the cutting.  Remember the way the bit is rotating?  This would cause the bit to pull the workpiece away from you forcefully.   The following picture shows what not to do!!

The correct method is to move the fence away from the router bit so that the 1/4″ section of the groove you are removing with the second pass is on the side of the router bit farthest from the fence.  The following picture show the correct position of the fence relative to the router bit.  By setting up for the second pass this way you are once again feeding the workpiece into the direction of rotation of the bit.

Cuts like this need to be planned very carefully to ensure that the correct side of the router bit is doing the cutting.

Moving back to the hand held router, there are two different scenarios which determine feed direction.  Imagine a circular picture frame that you need to profile both the external and internal edges of.  Which direction to you rout?

Hold your right hand out again with fingers closed except your thumb and index finger.  Imagine your hand is the router.  If your right thumb is pointing to the workpiece then your index finger is showing the direction of travel of the router.  Take a look at the picture below.

You can see that when routing the outside edge of the picture frame, you need to move the router in a counter clockwise direction.  When routing the inside edge of the picture frame, you need to move the router in a clockwise direction.

I have found these two “right hand” memory aids very useful in determining router bit rotation and router feed direction.  I hope you do to.

I’ll end the article with a short video clip showing the Rockler Bench Cookies supporting a workpiece I was making some test cuts on.  I found they held the workpiece securely and it was nice to have it raised above the table.  I did find that I needed to lightly support the workpiece with my inboard hand to prevent it from tipping slightly.  I’m sure that if the workpiece was wider or if I had been using an offset base on the router, this would not have been necessary.   I can also see the Bench Cookies will be useful for other applications, sanding and finishing are two that come to mind.

In full disclosure, the links are affiliate links.  If you purchase anything from Rockler via the links, Rockler will send me buckets of money and I’ll be able to quit my day job and play in my workshop every day.  Not necessarily a bad thing

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Today I had to install pulls with centers of 5 1/8″. I tried out this method and it worked very well. Relatively quick and suprisingly accurate.

Assuming you are installing a pull with a distance between center holes of 3″. From each corner of the drawer mark in 3″. Then draw a series of diagonal parallel lines as shown in the image. Where they interesect will be at two points 3″ apart and centered on the drawer top to bottom and left to right. Pretty neat. I found that rather than measuring the 3″ from the corner of each drawer, it was quicker to cut a gauge block from a scrap piece of wood and use that to establish the marks from which to draw the lines.

You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.

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